Judy Blume Finally Sells Rights To Iconic Book

One of the most beloved children’s authors, Judy Blume, has just heckin’ signed the movie rights away for her iconic book Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret and our preteen selves are screaming.

Since writing her ground-breaking coming-of-age book in 1970 (yep, it’s nearly 50, WTFFF), Blume has turned down numerous offers to turn it into a film, but now, she finally said yes.

The rights were awarded to the California-based production company Gracie Films, led by James L. Brooks, and director and producer Kelly Fremon Craig, who worked on the 2016 coming-of-age film The Edge of Seventeen.

Fremon Craig told Deadline she spotted a tweet from 80-year-old Blume, who indicated she was ready for her books to be made into movies, and swung into action.

So which of my books, kids and/or adult would you want to see adapted for series or movie? I ask because I’m in LA meeting with many talented people. I think the time has come.

“I read this at 3am, and wrote my reps in the middle of the night: do whatever you can to get this,” Fremon Craig said.

“Then I wrote a long and passionate email to her, telling her what her books meant to me - particularly Margaret - how it came along at a time when I needed it most. She was the first author who made me fall in love with books and by extension, film.”

Blume was apparently a fan of Fremon Craig and agreed to get onboard with Gracie Films.

The book about periods, crushes and a young girl’s earnest search for God – like “Is it OK to pad your bra?” and “Why haven’t I gotten my period yet?”- might seem pretty tame these days, but at the time there were calls for it to be censored or banned from libraries (and Blume’s follow-up book, Forever).

Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret is also among Time’s list of the top 100 fiction books.